He has performed six tours across the world – Not PC (2010), What’s Happening White People? (2012), PC’s World (2014), Live Innit? (2017), Family Friendly Comedian (2022), and Englandia, which debuted in 2025.
Early life
Chowdhry was born in Edgeware in 1971. His father had emigrated to England in the 1964 to Southampton and worked as a bus conductor before buying a newsagent and sandwich shop.[8] He attended private school at The Harrodian School in Barnes.[9]
His mother passed away when he was five years old. [10]
As a child, he grew up watching a lot of stand up comedy including American and British acts from Morecambe and Wise, Benny Hill and Bruce Forsythe.[11]
His sundays were spent visiting a temple with his cousins and other relatives who enjoyed eating indian food together. [12]
Career
Chowdhry began his stand up career in 1998 and hosted the Channel 4 comedy series Stand Up for the Week as of the fifth series, having been a regular act for the third and fourth series. Chowdhry was the first British act to perform at the Caribbean Comedy Festival in Trinidad in 2003. He has been a guest panelist on 8 out of 10 Cats, Comedy World Cup, and Sorry, I Didn't Know. He has appeared on Live at the Apollo twice, in 2012 and 2015.
In 2016, he was one of the contestants on series three of the comedy show Taskmaster. In 2017, he was a guest stand-up performer in The Russell Howard Hour and also sold out the 10,000-seater Wembley Arena, becoming the first British Asian stand-up comic to do so.[13]
In 2020, Chowdhry appeared in the television drama series Devils.
Since 2021, he has been hosting the podcast The Paul Chowdhry PudCast, in which he interviews comedians. He uses the signature phrase "what's happening white people?" at the start of his stand-up routines.
He performed Family-Friendly Comedian in Riyadh as part of the "Riyadh Laughs" comedy festival on 1 December 2023.[14]
Incident at Lowestoft gig in 2017
A man was arrested after causing distress and abusive language at the Marina Theatre during Chowdhry's 'Live Innit' performance. [15]
Incident at Hammersith, London gig in 2021
David Haye was cleared of assault, which he was accused of halfway during Chowdhry's 'Family-Friendly Comedian' performance. The judge said that Haye had no case to answer. [16]
Incident at Southend-on-Sea gig in 2025
A fight had broken out in the theatre stalls within the Cliffs Pavillion due to a heckler interrupting Chowdhry throughout the performance.[17]
Racist attack against Chowdhry in 2004
Chowdhry was attacked by a heckler in 2004 at the Bound And Gagged club, then 29, Chowdry called the police who attended but no arrests were made. [18]
Chowdhry makes an effort to keep fit during touring, telling Coach Magazine: "I don't eat chapatis, even though I’m Indian" – and replacing them with higher-protein substitutes like bulgur wheat and quinoa. "If I only had ten minutes to work out, I’d do high-intensity abs training.”[20] He has also spoken about his battles with mental health in the New Statesman: "Mental health problems aren’t really discussed in the Asian community."[21]
Talking to the South China Morning Post, he said, "People see you as an Asian comedian, whereas the other two guys coming to Hong Kong (Sean Meo and Michael McIntyre) aren't Asian comedians – they're just British. But they're not referred to as 'English white comedians'. I'm British. I was born in England. The fact that I'm Asian has very little to do with my stand-up, although it would have an influence for an obvious reason because of the way I'm perceived by certain people. So I play on the stereotypes and try to change them."[22]
Stand Up
Chowdhry started his stand up career performing in pubs and clubs around London, often risking racial attacks.[23]
Chowdhry has received numerous awards, including the Comedy award at the Eastern Eye Arts, Culture & Theatre Awards 2019, Comedian of the Year award at the Asian Voice Political & Public Life Awards 2019, and he was nominated for Entertainer of the Year by the British Asian Awards 2019. His show Live Innit? won Best Live Event 2018 at the ITV Asian Media Awards.[24]
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